§ Mr. Hickmetasked the Secretary of State for Social Services, pursuant to the reply of 25 February, Official Report, columns 71–2, (1) if he will itemise the admissible expenses for which general practitioners are eligible and, for each expense, give the average sum received by individual general practitioners and the total cost of such expenses to the National Health Service;
270W(2) what is the net income paid on average to a general practitioner and the total cost to the National Health Service of the income of all general practitioners within the service.
§ Mr. Kenneth ClarkeThe remuneration arrangements for general medical practitioners are designed to reimburse to the profession as a whole the costs they incur providing general medical services. Data on actual expenses are not known until three years after they have been incurred.
Some expenses are reimbursed directly to the doctors incurring them; the remainder are reimbursed indirectly on an average basis through fees and allowances. In the last financial year 1983–84 directly reimbursed expenses are estimated to have been £10,207 per doctor. The review body concluded that £9,290 per doctor should be reimbursed indirectly through fees and allowances in that year. The intended average net income was £20,160 from 1 April 1983 and £20,670 from 1 January 1984. Total expenditure in Great Britain in 1983–84 on general medical services including payments for drugs supplied by dispensing doctors was £1,099.572 million.
§ Mr. Hickmetasked the Secretary of State for Social Services, pursuant to his reply of 25 February, Official Report, column 71–2, (1) if any savings on the adjustment of reimbursement prices paid to dispensing doctors will be made to the National Health Service;
(2) over what period of time and for how long dispensing doctors have been obtaining discounts on drugs costs from wholesalers and manufacturers.
§ Mr. Kenneth ClarkeI shall let my hon. Friend have a reply as soon as possible.